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ESL forum >
Ask for help > Phrase meaning
Phrase meaning
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crissorrir
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Phrase meaning
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Hi everyone!
Need your help again. I read a sentence at the school book that, besides my efforts I could not understand. It�s the story of a dog that destroyed his owner�s car. It�s the part in inverted commas.
...What had been a sturdy, dependable method of delivering frozen food around the city "would now not have looked out of place by a beach on a hot summer�s day"
Thank you!
Cris |
29 May 2014
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Cricria
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Hello,
It is a metafor. It means that:
"now" (following what ever happened in the story)
"would not have looked out of place" (not unordinary)
this is the metafor:
like the "beach on a hot summer�s day"
meaning for the beach a hot summer�s day is not unordinary.
Is that what you needed help with?
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29 May 2014
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cunliffe
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Cricria makes a good point. This is quite obscure and difficult to know exactly what is meant.
So, before the damage, the van was like a mobile freezer. Now, it �s something you might see by the beach on a hot summer �s day. Mmm - maybe now that the dog has destroyed the cooling mechanism, it looks hot and sweltering inside?
I wonder whether the next sentence would make this any clearer? |
29 May 2014
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yanogator
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My interpretation is that people generally don �t take their pristine car to the beach, since it will come home filled with sand, and with salty wet marks on the seat, so the vehicle that was once very high quality, is now just a "junker" that is used for the most mundane purposes.
Bruce |
29 May 2014
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cunliffe
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@ Bruce, a-ha, that makes sense! |
29 May 2014
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yanogator
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Thanks, Lynne, but it �s still just a theory, since the structure of the sentence doesn �t lead a person to that conclusion. It �s certainly no surprise that Cris didn �t understand it. Bruce |
30 May 2014
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crissorrir
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Thank you all guys! the three explanations were very good, but Bruce�s explanation makes sence at the story context.
Thanks again!
Cris |
30 May 2014
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